Video Review: Nitecore TM03 (XHP70, 1x 18650, 2800+ lumens)

great video as always. can you please measure if the strobe is the same output as turbo? a 3000 lumen strobe must be wicked in a light this size. im expecting it will probably be only 1200 lumens on strobe….

Now who knows if the light meter reads it correctly…. I’m getting pulses from about 370 lumens to 468 lumens. It’s hard to do an apples to apples- because strobes seem brighter to your eyes, but looking at it on a white wall it definitely isn’t anywhere near full power. It looks brighter than it really may be.

Very cool review!

Great video! You are so professional! :+1: What equipment like camera do you use to shoot such an amazing video?

I use a black magic pocket cinema camera for most stuff, and a Panasonic g7 for supplemental footage. They both share a common lens mount, and I use a combination of c-mount, 35mm manual still lenses, and a few modern micro 4/3 lenses.

I shoot my night stuff with lenses with an f-stop as low as a 1.4 and I have one video light that I can dial in a color temperature. Then I color correct my footage slightly to make everything match and adjust levels in post for over and under exposed stuff.

I shoot at 24fps too, which has that film feel.

Thank you for testing this. I wonder why they couldn’t or didn’t make the strobe at full power? If it’s a tactical light with the secondary switch for instant strobe, the buyer may purposely buy the light because of this feature, and would indeed like a 3000 lumens pocket sized light.

Thanks for the in-depth review, I had to go ahead and get one of these as I just couldn’t resist… boost or not. :slight_smile:

Had to laugh when you were trying to spark the cell when installing it, my luck will probably let me do it when I’m NOT trying to. hahaha I purchased a back-up cell, just in case. A bit pricey but not bad for a proprietary. Beats the price of a Canon DSLR battery pack, that’s for sure!

So much about this light is intriguing, from the deep reflector to the boost circuit, the lever action on the tail, they’re really creating new boundaries over at Nitecore and I just had to see for myself with a hands on… thanks for the guide and all the pertinents.

I was able to get it to spark, when I wasn’t recording. Trust me- it does! I feel the deep reflector way have been a missed opportunity… if outfitted with a better throwing emitter or made smooth. I’m finishing up my Acebeam K70 review, and that dedomed XHP35 HI would have been pretty cool, driven hard in this light. And yes… way cheaper than a Canon battery. Thanks!

FWIW, every time I see you approach that tree now I’ll be looking for those blamed hornets!

Anyone want to know more about the “proprietary” cell? The expensive Nitecore TM-03 battery that is “high drain” and “high capacity”?

I bought a back-up directly from the “NitecoreStore”. It came in today, before the light made it. And who’d a thunk what I found inside? A simple little ol Panasonic PF! That’s right, with circuitry top and bottom making it proprietary! Figure I’ll take the circuitry off and attach it to a Samsung 30Q and see what happens. :slight_smile:

+1

Have you found any other 18650 that can run this light on high? I’m about to buy this but if it cannot accept any other 18650 then its a no go for me.

Nice review by the way

the cell is proprietary, a normal 18650 won’t run this light properly, if at all.

Thanks for answering this for me Dale. I wasn’t on the site a whole lot last month.

OMG how cute they made a little proprietary cell out of a PF. Pffffft is more like it. Just when I though it was safe to go back in the Nitecore store. Man Dale, that’s dope. BTW Thanks for the Review MHanlen.

I should also point out that with both negative and positive contacts on top of the cell one must be quite concious of this when inserting the light into a charger as it is all too easy for both contacts to touch the chargers tab and short the cell. While this should only result in a brief spark during a normal insertion, it’s feasible that the protection circuit could blow or trip and effectively ruin a $25.00 proprietary cell.

Thanks for the brilliant review, the mode switching seems complicated somewhat, I would really like to see some of these decent high power single cell torches made without the strobe mode at all because it can just be a pain sometimes I reckon.

So is the functionality of the cell within the light simply based on having an exposed negative contact up near where the standard positive contact? And the rest of the circuitry is only the cells built in protection? If this is the case then mightn’t it be a straightforward to mod your own high drain cell for this light and skip the circuitry altogether? Or am I way off here?

Unless there’s a circuit board in the battery that creates a “handshake” with the light. But yes… you’re basically right in your assumption. That’s all that appears to be going on from a simple examination.

The contact board for the driver has multiple contact points that take ground and positive from the top of the cell. There is also still a ground supply through the rear of the cell. While there is actually a protection circuit added to the PF cell there are two additional ground strips that are for a separate purpose. When I had the driver out of the light I tried getting through current with a normal cell and tapped in to different points on the contact board even simultaneously, this did not work the modes of the driver though, all contacts are required in order to hit Turbo.

I replaced the panasonic cell with a high discharge 3000mAh cell and the light works fine, not much brighter but a little.

I have since removed the XHP-70 and put in an MT-G2 as I prefer the tint and beam profile from the bigger emitter.

Edit: Rereading some notes I see I had put an Efest 3500mAh cell in place of the PanPF. After that it was getting 3129 lumens in my lightbox. The PF gave 3091 lumens.

Battery circuitry…

Thick copper heat sink under the XHP-70 with extreme 14ga wires…

Check out THIS THREAD POST for a series of pictures of the internals…

TM03 fitted with MT-G2 emitter…

M4D M4X suggested grounding the contact board at the circled spots in the below picture, but I don’t know if that would allow the use of a regular cell or not

Hope there’s something helpful here. :wink: